Chapter 167 March Appointment [5k HD Remastered Version]

"My Lord Knight, eat the fish."

Looking at the charred river fish in his hand, the leading knight with a flat nose did not eat it. He looked around and saw that there were only seven or eight remaining knights around him.

Their armor was covered with dust, and they lay on the mud without a trace of chivalrous etiquette.

They escaped from Chateau Jeanne d'Arc under the cover of night and ran for half the night before finally arriving here.

Just a few days ago, their daily breakfast consisted of fine cheese, bread and steak.

Now there is only a small fish the size of a palm that has been roasted black.

He is the knight commander of the Duke of Kush, and those people are just a group of unarmed farmers.

Now that the Duke of Kush is dead and Chateau Jeanne d'Arc has been captured, they have deserted the battlefield and have lost all their honors. They may even be stripped of their knighthood.

Thinking of this, the knight could not help but burst into tears. His crying was not a big deal, as the other knights were also moved to tears.

"Okay, stop crying, stop crying." After crying for nearly ten minutes, the flat-nosed knight named Drolt propped up his sword and stuffed the charred fish into his mouth, "Wipe your tears, what a shame."

"Knight Commander, what should we do now?"

The long grass leaves scratched Droert's waist. He looked in the direction of Jeanne d'Arc, where a goshawk was circling in the morning light.

"Let's go and report to Prince Condai. Not only did they resist, but they even dared to kill the noble Duke..."

The flat-nosed knight took a deep breath.

"When the imperial decree arrives, I will let them know what cruelty is!"

………………

Inside the Jeanne d'Arc town hall, the Salvation Army flag has been hung on the wall.

The soldiers and the wounded lay on the valuable corridor carpet, resting their heads on the shrine and dozing off.

Busak, who came to deliver the documents, had to tiptoe and find space among the bodies and hands and feet on the ground before he could push open the door of the meeting room.

Inside the gate, Jeshka was standing in front of Horn and reporting to him about the previous handling of the robbery.

"...those hooligans who took advantage of the chaos to commit atrocities should all be hanged. I still say the same thing: no killing, no robbery, and no insulting women.

I have turned a blind eye to their attempts to extort money, gamble or hire prostitutes, so please don’t push them any further.”

"I understand." Jeshka nodded, called a few black-clad soldiers outside the door and walked towards the outer room.

At this moment, Horn had gauze wrapped around his head, his beard was untidy, and his eyes were bloodshot.

Sitting on the velvet chair of the City Hall, Jeanne was snoring intermittently with her arms hanging across her chest and her head resting on the back of the chair.

Busak handed Horn a few sheets of white paper covered with mud. "We got about 40000 gold pounds from the city hall and the church. We are currently using it to buy medicine and gauze. Here is the account."

Picking up the account, Horn glanced at it briefly and put it aside: "Are all the granaries open?"

"It's open. The first batch of relief grain has been distributed, but the grain merchants are very dissatisfied and want to see you..."

"How are the citizens?"

"They are also clamoring to see you. They insist that the Duke's tens of thousands of pounds belong to them and they want to get them back."

"You're dreaming. Go tell them that this money is the devil's assets. If they say the money is theirs, they are funding the devil." Horn took out a note and wrote on it. "If they don't agree, charge them with 'aiding the devil' and send them to the ice cellar in the west to wake up!"

Horn stamped the note with a radish and took a bite of the crispy and sweet radish: "Anything else?"

"And this." Picking up the note, Busack pulled out a piece of yellow paper with rough edges and handed it to Horn. "This is our post-war statistics on casualties."

Although he knew that there would be heavy casualties in this battle, Horn still couldn't help choking when he saw the list submitted by Busak.

Horn and his team mobilized nearly 12800 young and strong men, and many more laborers joined later, both men and women. All in all, there were about 15000 people.

Among these Salvation Army refugees, 476 died, 1127 were seriously injured, 1453 were slightly injured, 1644 were missing, and 1912 escaped.

After final statistics, there were only about 8300 people who could continue fighting, of which nearly half were soldiers from the old camp, and less than one-third of the first batch of trained Holy Gunners died.

To be honest, if Danay could really hold on and gather the remaining knights to fight Horn and the others on Citizens Road, it might be Horn who got beheaded.

But the Duke has always been a monarch who lives a life of luxury and debauchery, and spends a quarter of the year outside.

He lied that he was training a secret army, but based on the current intelligence, he was actually just socializing in the capital of France. How could he have the ambition to do that?

Putting down the list in his hand and placing it on the table, Horn walked to the window.

Horn opened the small round window and looked outside. He hadn't slept all night and he couldn't hide the fatigue in his eyes.

At this time, the bell representing the morning has rung, and in the Town Hall Square under the bell, the wailing of the wounded is almost drowning out the bell.

Columns of smoke rose from the center of the city from huge boiling cauldrons of cooking linen.

The special medical soldiers in the old camp used splints wrapped in grass ash to clamp the broken bones of the refugees, or poured freshly prepared medicine into the mouths of the wounded.

Adults, holding their children's hands, searched for their relatives and friends among the sick and dead bodies while crying.

In front of the town hall, there were corpses and refugees lying everywhere. The refugee army, which had been fighting all night, was so tired that they just found a place to sleep.

As the bell rang, the door of the city hall opened, and not only the elders, but also the refugees of the Salvation Army each nominated a representative to enter the meeting hall.

Horn stood by the window to enjoy the fresh air, but did not sit down immediately. Instead, he asked the elders and representatives who were seated to listen to Busak's summary report on Bamanda's confession first.

Only after Busak finished speaking did Horn limp to the table and sit down.

"You have all heard Bamanda's confession. Let's discuss it." Horn said in a deep voice, knocking on the table.

The Salvation Army's top executives looked at each other, but no one spoke.

If Bamanda was not lying, then this news was simply horrifying.

帝国那边来的不是3、4个敕令连，而是全部的9个敕令连，顺带5个雇佣兵团5500人，一共8200人从东边到来。

In the east, the church led an army of 900 people consisting of 2000 extraordinary knights, 1800 serfs, and 4700 armed peasants, and marched upstream.

More than a hundred extraordinary knights advanced in batches and almost defeated Horn and his group of more than 10,000 refugee soldiers. If it weren't for the clockwork guns, those refugee soldiers would have been scattered long ago.

If Fort Joan of Arc had city walls, it could be defended, but unfortunately Fort Joan of Arc does not have city walls.

The Duke's castle cannot be captured in a short period of time. What should be done if the enemy attacks and the defenders inside break out?

"Brother, I will bring some kid soldiers to attack again later." Jeanna said with bloodshot eyes.

"The moat is impassable."

"Or we can dig up the soil and block the moat first."

"Have you ever calculated the earthwork?" a former civil engineering worker scolded, "Three days won't be enough."

"Or we can hide in civilian houses and fight them."

"We can ride quickly to the castle ahead and build a defense line first..."

"It's too late."

Looking in the direction of the sound, I saw a white-haired old man sitting on a small stool by the door.

"Where did this old man come from?" Duvalon immediately stepped out and directed the other guards to step forward, "Take him out."

"and many more."

Horn called out to the guards; he remembered this man.

Earlier at the bridge, it was he who pulled himself away and avoided the knights' charge, otherwise he would not have been only slightly injured.

"Are you the one who helped me on the bridge earlier?" "I'm just a secret party member passing by." The white-haired old man said to Horn, "I told you my name, my name is Crispa, and Carrie was the one who contacted me earlier."

Everyone suddenly realized, is it someone from the Ruoan Party?

"What does Master Crispa have to say?" asked Madeleine curiously.

"Just because you relied on luck to defeat a few square-flag knights and squire knights, you think you can defeat Prince Kongdai's nearly three thousand extraordinary knights?"

Pasrick, who was unabashedly using the alias Crispa, sat with a sword in his hand. “Excuse me, even if you take that castle, you still can’t defeat the Imperial Order Company, and you won’t even be able to resist.”

"We can rely on the castle for defense, and we can also set up defense lines along the way." Madeleine responded unconvinced.

"You have less than three days in total, and the enemy has 12,000 regular troops. What kind of defense do you want to set up?"

Pasrick pointed to the closely packed wooden houses outside and said, "Let me not say anything else. What if they set fire to the city? Don't even think about getting water. Do you think they will be waiting for you by the river?"

Jeanne wanted to retort, but when she thought of what those knights had done, she stopped talking.

In the eyes of those foreign knights, the people of Qianhe Valley are nothing more than livestock. What is there that they dare not do?

“I find it funny when I hear you say that mortals defeated extraordinary knights. Two-thirds of the defeated extraordinary knights were electrocuted to death by witches. How can you say that mortals defeated extraordinary knights?

You have brought out more than 10,000 young and strong men, but now most of them are dead or wounded. There are only over 8,000 left who can really fight, and they are all untrained and inexperienced soldiers.

You have extraordinary knights for field battles, you have battle-hardened infantry for street battles, how many shots can your alchemical gun have? How many people can it hit at once?

Or do you want to learn the beastman's fighting style of going into the mountains and forests to shoot arrows and move to another place?

I still say that these refugees under your command are all common people, without any training or organization, and the beastmen have been hunting since they were young."

The atmosphere, which had been slightly relaxed, became depressing again. The depressing atmosphere weighed on the hearts of these elders and representatives, making it difficult for them to breathe.

Only Horn looked at the old man, looking thoughtful.

"Then we can go in batches." Madeleine suggested, "Although the main river is blocked, Jeanne d'Arc is a water and land transportation center, so we can escape in batches by small roads and waterways."

"Oh, yes. Isn't it enough to break through the land and water checkpoints before the Imperial Order Company arrives?"

Amid the discussions of the crowd, Pasrick's cold snort sounded unusually harsh.

"If you run away, what will the villagers of Jeanne d'Arc do? If they can't catch you, who do you think they will vent their anger on?

Do you know that if it weren't for you, those villagers would never have entered Prince Kongdai's sight, and they would only cause harm to the citizen craftsmen.

What? Do you still want to load all the villagers of Zhendark Castle, about 70,000 to 80,000 people nearby, onto the ship and transport them away?"

The entire conference hall fell silent once again. It was not until this moment that they realized belatedly that they were facing a dead end.

If you can't hold on, you will be flattened by the order.

If they don't fight back, the villagers will be retaliated against by the nobles.

It is impossible to escape because all the land and water checkpoints are blocked.

Everyone was so determined to save the refugees in Jeanne d'Arc, but in the end, nothing was done?

Even the most determined Jeanne fell into a trance. Was it possible that everything they did was meaningless?
However, this trance lasted only for a moment. After Jeanna woke up, she looked at the old man in front of her with some anxiety.

"That sounds good, so you must have a solution?"

Pasrick smiled mysteriously at Jeanne: "Bring me a pen and paper."

After a moment's pause, Jeanne immediately grabbed a piece of paper and a pen from the table and handed them to Pasrick with great anticipation.

Paslick picked up the quill, wrote a line of big words on the paper with great force, and gave it back to Jeanne.

Jeanna took the paper, but saw six simple words written on it: "Haha, I won't tell you."

"You!" Jeanne's face turned red instantly. "This is a matter of life and death for tens of thousands of people in Jeanne d'Arc. If you have a solution, don't hide it."

"Haha, I won't tell you."

"Do you have any solution? Are you trying to make fun of me?" The veins on Jeanna's forehead twitched twice.

Horn stepped forward and calmed down Jeanne, who was furious at the provocation. He bowed to Pasrick and said:
"Master Crispa, if you can help it, don't tease Jeanne. We don't have much time."

Crossing his legs, Pasrick looked Horn up and down and said carelessly:
"I have a letter from the Duchess of Hema Stone."

Pasrick took out a lacquered envelope from his arms: "This letter only has a heading, a closing and a seal, but no matter what I write on it, as long as it is within my ability, the Duchess of Hema Stone will admit that it is true.

Needless to say, I believe you all know how precious this favor is.

As long as I wrote a letter to plead for the villagers of Joan of Arc, they would not launch a massacre for the Duchess's sake, and at most they would provoke the local citizens, wealthy businessmen and armed small peasant landowners.

This does not mean that the refugees who participated in the siege of Fort Jeanne can escape. If they and their families stay in Fort Jeanne, they will still be implicated by you..."

The eyes of the Salvation Army leaders around him lit up. Madeleine said impatiently, "Then let's take the Salvation Army and leave by boat to find Kasha County..."

"Hey, who told you I was going to give it to you? I was just telling you I'm really awesome." Pasrick took the letter in his arms. "Besides, why should I give it to you?"

"Master Chrispa, you've said so much, it's impossible that you're just teasing us, right?" Sissi, who was standing aside, looked at the white-haired old man in front of her and pleaded.

"Tsk, you have no spirituality." Pasrick shook his head. "Do you know that the most important thing for a leader is to be able to draw big pictures? You still have to learn that."

"So what do you want?" Horn's originally calm voice finally showed a ripple.

"I'll be frank. First, I'm telling you that this letter of protection for the villagers won't last long. It will last at most three months. By then, the knights will still go on a killing spree.

You must bear the consequences of your own sins and you are not allowed to escape.

I can tell you a place, near Fort Jeanne d'Arc, where you can train. During this time, it will be difficult for the knights to harass you, but they will not retreat either.

In three months, you will have to leave that place, reoccupy Fort Jeanne d'Arc, and drive the knights out completely. Do you dare to agree?"

Can we defeat those knights in three months?
Everyone's eyes were focused on Horn's face, and they were all waiting for Horn's answer.

"I promise you." Horn answered, staring straight into Pasrick's eyes.

Pasrick shook the letter in his hand: "Even if you don't go out, I still can't do anything to you. After all, you are a rare witch man. If An III will not allow us to kill you...

I just hope that the decision you made under the tree last night will also be your decision in the future, and don’t let those innocent souls look down on you.”

"That's also what I fear the most."

"Okay." Pasrick held up two fingers and continued, "Second, you have to join the Joan Party and share the technology of the alchemical gun. You also have to recognize me as your master."

This is what Horn was supposed to do. He has no foundation and also needs resources to maintain his current team.

"I promise you, the initiation ceremony can be held at any time."

"That's not urgent." Paslick raised his third finger, "Third..."

At this point, Pasrick suddenly fell silent. He stroked the letter in his hand, glanced at Jeanne, and sighed:

"I have a goddaughter. I watched her grow up. You are bound to make her sad. I only ask you not to hurt her. Can you promise?"

A white-haired figure instantly appeared in front of Horne's eyes. He didn't look at Jeanne, and said in a deep voice: "I can't guarantee it, but I will try my best."

"That's enough." Pasrick stepped forward and gave Horn a high five. "Don't let us down."

"The knights will be here in three days. You should think carefully about how to appease the refugees to go with you." After saying this, Pasrick turned and walked out the door.

"Hey hey hey." Boussac, who was awakened by a series of unexpected events, shouted, "That place is in the territory of Jeanne d'Arc, not far from us, and it can be defended against knights. You haven't told me yet."

"Actually, you all know that place." Pasrick yawned, "Didn't you just walk here from there?"

(End of this chapter)